Update: James Whiffin was sentenced to four years imprisonment
October 1998
Old men guilty of raping young boys
MONSTERS who preyed on young boys in Bricket Wood nudist camps were finally punished for their crimes – 30 years later.
Robert Showler, 82, of Ampthill, in Bedfordshire, and Lauchlan Ashcroft, 68, of Lye Lane, Bricket Wood, had inflicted years of torment through rape, assaults and beatings almost on a daily basis.
The pair were part of a sadistic group of men who passed youngsters around like toys. In the cover of wooden chalets and caravans, the children endured appalling acts of sexual depravity.
Ashcroft was co-owner of the Gardenia naturist camp while Showler lived permanently on the neighbouring Spielplatz site and, between them, led a reign of terror.
One victim estimates that he was abused approximately a thousand times by Lauchlan Ashcroft over a period of six years or so
Two years ago, another one of their victims, after watching a television programme on child abuse, decided he could no longer keep quiet about what had happened at the hands of the men in the early 1970’s when he was just nine years old.
Now 36 and married with children, he could not live with the secret any more.
Another man on trial was James Whiffin, 53, who had also been involved in the paedophile ring. In passing sentence, Judge Ronald Moss concluded that, even at 82, Showler still posed a risk to children.
Ashcroft was jailed for seven years while Showler received nine months. Whiffin will be sentenced later this week.
